Category: Blog

The title of this book is alluring. Halik offers his reader a masterful analysis of the challenges that face the Christian faith. His argument is that our present crisis is a crossroad. One road ( and perhaps the one we journey on in this country ) is leading to division and irrelevance. At the present […]

As world leaders gather for the Funeral Mass at St Peters Basilica followed by his burial at Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore I share some happy memories of the hospitality of ( now HE Cardinal ) Rolandas Makrickas and the community there to journey with them during Holy Week in 2024. A wonderful week with […]

Easter Day is the occasion when, year on year, Christian people throughout the world celebrate the good news of Jesus’ resurrection. It is an awesome mystery as well as conviction that we should share and show others of the wonder and love of God made real in Christ. The disciples and successive generations of Christians […]

My first experience of silence ( real silence) was with the Community of the Sisters of the Love of God at Fairacres in Oxford in 1979. I was an undergraduate reading theology at Kings College London. I have an abiding memory of the intensity of the silence and worship. I have been a regular visitor […]

Mobility brings freedom and a certain amount of unpredictability. I spent last weekend in Birmingham engaged in a ministerial project for the Diocese. Travelling back on Sunday morning brought with it clear blue skies until I reached the Oxford bypass when rain swept in with relentless force. While some drivers seemed unaffected by the downpour my car seemed to be very sensitive to patches of surface water combined with strong crosswinds. This was the time and space into which I […]

  I have spent some time in recent months dealing with the accumulation of over 40 years of books. Some of them I inherited from others. Many have been picked up in second hand book shops. Others part of my ongoing adventure of theological learning and education. There are gifts. There are textbooks. Some are […]

I much enjoyed reading an authorised biography of John Habgood written by David Wilbourne. It is an insightful and wise evaluation of the former Archbishop of York. Here is a link to my reflections commending the insights and wisdom of this biographical reflection.   https://www.sarum.ac.uk/how-would-you-like-to-be-remembered/   While sorting through some random books for the charity shop, […]

Inspector George Gently  is a crime drama  that ran over seven series. Set in the North East of England in the 1960s it centres on Newcastle, Northumberland and County Durham. Martin Shaw, Lee Ingleby take the lead roles as Inspector and Detective Sergeant supported by Simon Hubbard and Lisa McGrillis as police constables. The death […]

  Perhaps ‘good’ Church has a few essential things in common?   1. They share a deeply incarnational view of the world, the recognition that matter is the scaffolding of spirit, the two deeply entwined; each Church knows that the commonplace, when seen with the eye of the heart, is holy, and that the ordinary is […]

patience   An absolute patience. Trees stand up to their knees in fog. The fog slowly flows uphill. White cobwebs, the grass leaning where deer have looked for apples. The woods from brook to where the top of the hill looks over the fog, send up not one bird. So absolute, it is no other […]